Week 8 assignment: essay – interrelationships reflection apa format | Applied Sciences homework help
- Look at some of your own photographs. What school of photography do you be- long in? Which photographer is closest to your style?
summary The capacity of photography to record reality faithfully is both a virtue and a fault. It makes many viewers of photographs concerned only with what is presented (the subject matter) and leaves them unaware of the way the subject matter has been represented (the form). Because of its fidelity of presentation, photography seems to some to have no transformation of subject matter. This did not bother early pho- tographers, who were delighted at the ease with which they could present their subject matter. The pictorialists, on the other hand, relied on nineteenth-century representational painting to guide them in their approach to form. Their carefully composed images are still valued by many photographers. But the reaction of the straight photographers, who wished to shake off any dependence on painting and disdained sentimental subject matter, began a revolution that emphasized the spe- cial qualities of the medium: especially the tonal range of the silver or platinum print (and now color print), the impersonality of the sharply defined object (and consequent lack of sentimentality), spatial compression, and selective framing. The revolution has not stopped there but has pushed on into unexpected areas, such as the exploration of the snapshot and the rejection of the technical standards of the straight photographers. Many contemporary photographers are searching for new ways of photographic seeing based on the capacity of digital cameras and comput- ers to transform and manipulate images. They are more intent on altering rather than recording reality. This is a very interesting prospect. jac16871_ch11_276-298.indd 298 12/9/17 10:17 AM 299 Source: Warner Brothers Chapter 12
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The history of cinema is, to an extent, dominated by technology. The earliest fea-ture films were black and white, usually projected at twenty-four frames per second, and silent. In the first few years of the twentieth century, they were often projected outdoors in town squares or indoors in social clubs and general-purpose public buildings, but soon special theaters appeared with incredible speed around the world. In 1926 sound permitted both music and dialogue to accompany the vi- sual images. Some films were in color in the 1920s and 1930s, but color films did not become standard until the 1940s and 1950s. Improvements in sound and image size, as well as experiments in 3-D films, followed and continue today. The most dramatic recent change is the abandonment of celluloid film in favor of digital production and digital projection. Since 2013 the industry has been almost entirely digital, so the term “film,” while out of date, is still useful for us in discussing theatrical features. The SubjecT MaTTer of filM Except in its most reductionist form, the subject matter of most great films is diffi- cult to isolate and restate in words. You could say that death is the subject matter of Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (Figure 12-1). But you would also need to observe that the knight’s sacrifice to save the lives of others—which he accomplishes by playing chess with Death—is also part of the subject matter of the film. As David Cook ex- plains in A History of Narrative Film, there is a complexity of subject matter in film that is rivaled only by literature. jac16871_ch12_299-329.indd 299 12/11/17 11:57 AM 300 ChApTEr 12 It may be that the very popularity of film and the ease with which we can access it lead us to ignore the form and the insights form offers into subject matter. For example, is it really possible to catch the subtleties of form of a great film in one viewing? Yet how many of us see a great film more than once? Audiences generally enjoy, but rarely analyze, films. Some of the analysis that follows may help your enjoyment as well as your analyses. Except perhaps for opera, film more than any of the other arts involves collab- orative effort. Most films are written by a scriptwriter, then planned by a director, who may make many changes. however, even if the director is also the scriptwriter, the film needs a producer, camera operators, an editor, designers, researchers, cos- tumers, actors, and actresses. Auteur criticism regards the director as equivalent to the auteur, or author, of the film. For most moviegoers, the most important persons involved with the film will almost surely be not the director but the stars who appear in the film. George Clooney, Angelina Jolie, Julia roberts, Meryl Streep, and Denzel Washington are more famous than such directors of stature as Ingmar Bergman, Fed- erico Fellini, Lina Wertmuller, Akira Kurosawa, Jane Campion, or Alfred hitchcock. DirecTing anD eDiTing The two dominant figures in early films were directors who did their own editing: D. W. Griffith and Sergei Eisenstein, unquestionably the great early geniuses of filmmaking. They managed to gain control over the production of their works so that they could craft their films into a distinctive art. Some of their films are still considered among the finest ever made. The Birth of a Nation (1916) and Intolerance (1918) by Griffith, and Battleship Potemkin (1925) and Ivan the Terrible (1941–1946) by Eisenstein, are still being FIGURE 12-1 Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (1957).The knight plays chess with Death in order to save the lives of the traveling citizens in the distance. The close shot balances the knight and Death in sharp focus, while the citizens are in soft focus. In chess, a knight sacrifice is often a ploy designed to achieve a stronger position, as in this film. ©AF archive/Alamy jac16871_ch12_299-329.indd 300 12/11/17 11:57 AM 301
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shown and are influencing contemporary filmmakers. These men were more than just directors. With many of their films, they were responsible for almost everything: writ- ing, casting, choosing locations, handling the camera, directing, editing, and financing. Directing and editing are probably the most crucial phases of filmmaking. Today most directors control the acting and supervise the photography, carried out by skilled technicians who work with such problems as lighting, camera angles, and focusing, as well as the motion of the camera itself (some sequences use a highly mobile camera, while others use a fixed camera). Among the resources available to directors making choices about the use of the camera are the kinds of shots that may eventually be edited together. A shot is a single exposure of the camera without a break. Some of the most important kinds of shots follow: Establishing shot: Usually a distant shot establishes important locations or figures in the action. Close-up: An important object, such as the face of a character, fills the screen. Long shot: The camera is far distant from the most important characters, objects, or scenes. Medium shot: What the camera focuses on is neither up close nor far distant. There can be medium close-ups and medium long shots, too. Following shot: The camera keeps a moving figure in the frame, usually keeping pace with the figure. Point-of-view shot: The camera records what the character must be seeing; when the camera moves, it implies that the character’s gaze moves. Tracking shot: A shot in which the camera moves forward, backward, or sidewise. Crane shot: The camera is on a crane or movable platform and moves upward or downward. Handheld shot: The camera is carried, sometimes on a special harness, by the camera operator. Recessional shot: The camera focuses on figures and objects moving away, as in Figure 12-10. A processional shot focuses on figures and objects moving toward the camera. When you see films, you probably see all these shots many times. Add to these specific kinds of shots the variables of camera angles, types of camera lenses, vari- ations in lighting, and variations in approach to sound, and you can see that the technical resources of the director are enormous. The addition of script and actors enriches the director’s range of choices so that they become almost dizzying. The editor puts the shots in order after the filming is finished. This selective process is highly complex and of supreme importance, for the structuring of the shots forms the film. The alternatives are often vast, and if the film is to achieve an artistic goal— insight into its subject matter—the shot succession must be creatively accomplished. The editor trims the shots to an appropriate length, then joins them with other shots to create the final film. Edited sequences sometimes shot far apart in time and place are organized into a unity. Films are rarely shot sequentially, and only a part of the total footage is shown in a film. The old saying of the bit-part actor—“I was lost on the cutting-room floor”—attests to the fact that sometimes interesting footage is omitted. jac16871_ch12_299-329.indd 301 12/11/17 11:57 AM 302 ChApTEr 12 In a relatively short time, the choice and editing of shots have become almost a kind of language. The parents on the left of the medium shot from Yasujiro’s Tokyo Story (Figure 12-2) seem an essential part of the family because the physical space is so limited, but the irony is that later shots show them very much separated emo- tionally and psychologically from their ungrateful, busy children. It helps to know the resources of the editor, who cuts the film to create the rela- tionships between takes. The way these cuts are related is at the core of the director’s distinctive style. Some of the most familiar of the director’s and editor’s choices follow: Continuity cut: shots edited to produce a sense of narrative continuity, following the action stage by stage. The editor can also use a discontinuity cut to break up the narrative continuity for effect. Jump cut: sometimes just called a “cut”; moves abruptly from one shot to the next, with no preparation and often with a shock Cut-in: an immediate move from a wide shot to a very close shot of the same scene; the editor may “cut out,” as well Cross-cutting: alternating shots of two or more distinct actions occurring in dif- ferent places (but often at the same time) Dissolve: one scene disappearing slowly while the next scene appears as if be- neath it Fade: includes fade-in (a dark screen growing brighter to reveal the shot) and fade-out (the screen darkens, effectively ending the shot) FIGURE 12-2 Medium interior shot from Tokyo Story (1953), by Yasujirō Ozu. Ozu is considered one of the finest Japanese directors. Tokyo Story tells of older parents visiting their children in postwar Tokyo. The older generation realizes it has no place in the new Japan, as their children are too busy to spend time with them. ©Shochiku/Kobal/rEX/Shutterstock jac16871_ch12_299-329.indd 302 12/11/17 11:57 AM 303
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Wipe: transition between shots, with a line moving across or through the screen separating one shot from the next Graphic match: joining two shots that have similar composition, color, or scene Montage sequence: a sequence of images dramatically connected but physically disconnected Shot, reverse shot: a pair of shots in which the first shot shows a character looking at something; reverse shot shows what the character sees Our responses to film depend on the choices that directors and editors make regarding shots and editing almost as much as on the nature of the narrative and the appeal of the actors. In a relatively short time, film editing has become a kind of language—a language of imagery with close to universal significance. When the editing is handled well, it can be profoundly effective, because it is impossible in real-life experience to achieve what the editor achieves. By eliminating the irrelevant, good editing accents the relevant. The montage—dramatically con- nected but physically disconnected images—can be made without a word of dialogue. PERCEPTION KEY Editing 1. Study a film such as The Bourne Identity and identify at least three kinds of shots mentioned in the text. Find a point-of-view shot, a tracking shot, or a handheld shot. Which is most dramatic?